[NEWTON, Isaac (1643-1727)]. -- HARRIS, John (c. 1588-1658). Lexicon Technicum: or, An Universal English Dictionary of Arts and Sciences. London: for Dan Browne, et al, 1716-1710.
2 volumes, folio (330 x 197 mm). Titles printed in red and black, engraved portrait frontispiece, and 10 plates only (of 14), 6 folding, numerous woodcut illustrations (2 plates torn and repaired). (Vol. I lacking 2M1 (Eng-Ent), vol. I title-page with marginal tear, not affecting text, some occasional dampstaining, small hole to 5E1 of vol. II affecting part of stave of music, front free endpaper in vol. I detached, some browning and spotting). Contemporary paneled calf with blind tools, spines in 7 compartments with raised bands, renewed morocco gilt lettering-pieces in second compartments (joints splitting, some surface wear, ends worn). Provenance: John Lloyd (engraved bookplate), clerk to Jesus College, Oxford with manuscript notes and remnants of wax seals; contemporary inscription on title-page “Charles Lloyde: David Lloyde A:M. E Coll: Jesu. Oxon 1730”; Derek Gair Gibson (embossed stamps on front free endpapers).
FIRST EDITION of vol. II and third edition of vol. I, of the “first technical dictionary in any language” (PMM). This work is exceptionally important - the second volume in particular - for CONTAINING THE CONTEMPORARY PRINTING OF TEXTS BY ISAAC NEWTON; most notably the first printing of Newton’s only lifetime published work on chemistry, De Natura Acidorum (vol. II, introduction, b3-4). The two articles in vol. II on “curves” and “quadratures” contain the first translations into English of the two mathematical treatises Newton originally published (in Latin) in the 1704 Opticks. Newton’s work is also drawn upon in the articles relating to gravity, attraction, motion, light, color, and fluxions (calculus). ESTC N34178, T142408; PMM 171a (first edition).